How it adds up: dual reflections on the online engagement of one cohort of accounting students

In September 2020 module preparation began with a plethora of TEL (Technology Enhanced Learning) support and a bankable level of expertise in online teaching garnered over the summer. For the autumn term, the university pursued a blended learning approach, combining face-to-face interactive sessions and online core materials. In the spring term teaching was moved online following government restrictions.


The disciplinary context: Accounting and Finance
Face-to-face accounting information systems classes are dynamic with the focus being on students assimilating new information through the active learning technique of guided discovery (Fry et al., 2014) and sharing ideas through peer learning (Crouch and Mazur, 2001). This creates micro-communities of learners that through participation, share a common experience resulting in high levels of engagement.

The disciplinary context: English for Academic Purposes
Rather than following the lecture/seminar model, English Specific for Academic Purposes (ESAP) involves collaboratively unpacking spoken or written texts in groups of 16 maximum. Traditional classes usually focus on both productive and receptive interactive language tasks with considerable student-to-student interaction and tutor facilitation.
'Pandemic pedagogy', with its emphasis on a flipped classroomthe virtues of which have been extolled in language learning (Mehring and Leis, 2018)offered a new approach to incorporating these skills.
Students were expected to engage firstly with one hour of asynchronous material and consolidate understanding in the live lesson. However, three weeks in, it was clear that student participation in pre-class activities was not fulfilling expectations and rather than feeling 'flippin' marvellous' (Fry, 2020), we felt more flipped out. Two issues emerged: it was not ideal for learners to encounter material 'cold', i.e., without the scaffolding a tutorled approach affords. Secondly, the time required to complete the materials was invisible to students as it was not represented on the timetable. This was particularly problematic for the ESAP non-credit bearing module as it was a lower priority for students.
Despite well-signposted instructions and scaffolded online resources, review of VLE module analytics further revealed that few students completed the asynchronous resources. The result was that the cohort was underprepared for the live sessions. This was evidenced by student cameras being switched off, and a general reluctance to speak or use the chat function to discuss lecture content. The absence of visual and verbal clues from the students made it impossible to deliver timely feedback and adjust module delivery and content to better cater to student needs. The response For the ESAP module, the pre-lesson element was removed and students instead worked through tasks collaboratively with the tutor at first sight in the live class. Extension tasks were set from this, therefore the live workshop acted as a primer for further asynchronous activities. Student participation improved marginally but most importantly nobody lost face by admitting incompletion of pre-class work and this served well to improve tutor-student relations.
Online drop-in office hours for students to voluntarily attend and discuss issues with core discipline-specific materials were also established. Alas, for every week of term, the module convenor was alone in the virtual meeting room perhaps because students were embarrassed or felt they were imposing on lecturer time (Cronin, 1991, cited Guerrero andRod, 2013). Becoming ever more nervous, the response was to increase the frequency of communications via VLE announcements and cohort-wide emails. Yielding little engagement, the student representative was approached as a conduit to communicate with his peers. A positive result is that a preferred channel of communication was found, and whilst not ideal, the student representative was able to confirm that his peers had received, and were aware, of key information.

Recommendations
Students' overall engagement with the new online culture can be observed through Anderson's (1994) model of cross-cultural adaptation. A few of the 26 students were 'participators'. They were effective in asynchronous tasks and showed direct inquiry with us in live online lessons. Some students demonstrated that they were 'adjusters'. They tried to understand the new situation but were still actively coping throughout both terms.
Most students displayed 'time-server' behaviours by working at a low capacity with minimal participation and exhibiting poor productivity in their work (Anderson, 1994). With in-person delivery, degrees of engagement are also displayed; however, our takeaway is that remote learning coupled with studying outside the UK magnified this minimal participation and poor productivity. The statistical data showing student use of online resources (Figure 1) broadly reflects these findings. Students were more active in accessing resources before the summative assessments deadlines in February and April, supporting our 'time-server' behaviours observations. We assert that this behaviour contributed to lower coursework results for the module compared to previous years ( Figure 2). As digital learning becomes part of what a university does, institutions may consider additional support for inducting students into their instructional approaches. A gradual implementation of the flipped classroom would be less daunting for learners (Lo and Hew, 2017). Monitoring engagement for different provisions and over a longer period is also Collins and Blackett How it adds up: dual reflections on the online engagement of one cohort of accounting students Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, Issue 22: Compendium October 2021 5 recommended. Finally, greater timetabled visibility of asynchronous content could enhance participation by assisting students with time management.